The Puppet King

by Doug Niles

  Apparently today Rashas was not going to bother with a rebuke.

  “You need to be ready in two hours. There’s an emergency meeting of the Thalas-Enthia called for noon today.”

  “And how could the senate meet without their Speaker to preside?” Gilthas noted sarcastically.

  Now Rashas looked at him with narrowed eyes, and the young elf felt a stab of fear. Perhaps he had gone too far. He tried to force himself to stand straight, to meet the cold glare of that icy gaze, but after a few seconds, Gilthas found himself looking sheepishly at the floor.

  “Such a childish attitude does not befit an elf of your high station,” Rashas declared. “No doubt it’s that human blood again. I’d hoped you’d begin to outgrow it by now.”

  Gilthas knew that Rashas was, in fact, grateful for his human blood. He assumed that it was an ancestry of weakness, that it would help make the Speaker malleable to the will of the Thalas-Enthia. There was a time when the younger elf would have agreed with him. But now, after he had had long days to reflect on his father’s courage and had learned more about the reputation Tanis Half-Elven had earned throughout Krynn, he was not so sure.

  “What is the purpose of the meeting?” he asked.

  “There is word from the western frontiers, just confirmed by messenger this dawn. Our trade routes with Ergoth and Solamnia are being plagued with banditry.”

  “Then the reports last week were not just rumors?” Gilthas asked, unable to keep a twinge of triumph from his voice. He had urged that the senate act when they had first learned of a plundered steel caravan, but the Thalas-Enthia had disbelieved the elf who reported it because he was a mere woodland elf who had been traveling in the company of humans. Gilthas had suggested that the humans be interviewed as well, but the senate would not allow the men into the hallowed chamber at the base of this lofty tower.

  “They have been confirmed by reliable reports. Now it is appropriate that the senate consider some action.”

  By “reliable,” Gilthas knew that Rashas meant either his own spies or the word of some wealthy elf of high caste and unimpeachable reputation.

  “If the griffons weren’t being so uncooperative,” the senator continued, “then we would have had word days ago!”

  “I see.” Gilthas refrained from saying the remark that rose to the tip of his tongue: If the Thalas-Enthia had treated Alhana Starbreeze with respect, instead of with extortion and imprisonment, the griffons would not have been offended. As it was, the beasts that had ever been loyal helpmates to the elves of Qualinesti had abandoned their ancient masters, returning instead to a life in the wild. Now they dwelled free and unsaddled among the lofty peaks of the high Kharolis.

  “As it was, a rider had to make his way on horseback, through the roughest part of the kingdom. And even so, he brings more questions than he does answers!”

  “Perhaps we should invite the princess back. Maybe she could talk some sense into the griffons.”

  Rashas’s glare was pure malevolence. “You should be a thousand times glad that the bitch is gone!” he snapped. “She was feeding you lie after lie, and you were too naive to see through her!”

  “I enjoyed talking to her,” Gilthas admitted, feeling bold again.

  “She, and your father as well, would have been the ruin of this kingdom! I should think that now you’d start to understand what that damned half-breed bastard was trying to do!”

  “Sometimes I think that the ‘half-breed bastard’ has more courage and honor in his little toe than any elf left in Qualinesti!” snapped the Speaker, flushed out of his reticence by the senator’s insults.

  “You’re still a fool!” Rashas raged. “Now get ready. I told you, the Thalas-Enthia meets in two hours, and you’ll be there! Don’t even think about getting one of those headaches. You should be ashamed, claiming they keep you closed in a dark room! I think they’re just an excuse to keep you from doing your duty.”

  The senator stormed away, and Gilthas sighed, turning back toward the pristine view from his balcony, knowing that he had to do as he had been told.

  But it was so unspeakably hard!

  He thought of his last meeting with his father, probably the last time in his life he would ever see Tanis Half-Elven, who had been exiled from his homeland of Qualinesti. Only later did the son come to see what that sentence had meant to his father. At the time, the young and newly appointed speaker had been too concerned with his own future to worry about Tanis’s past. They had met at the edge of the kingdom—in fact, when Tanis had taken a step toward the border, elven sentries had shot arrows at the half-elf’s feet to underscore the rigidity of the banishment. Father and son had embraced for too short a time, and Gilthas had promised to honor the legacy that had brought him to this throne and to do what he could to block the most shortsighted and mean-spirited acts of the Thalas-Enthia.

  Yet so far his presence had been almost entirely symbolic. It seemed that the senate did whatever Rashas wanted, and the presence of Gilthas Solostaran only added legitimacy to their acts.

  His musings of self-pity were interrupted by a hesitant knock at the door.

  “Enter.”

  His mood brightened as he saw the beautiful, golden-haired wild elf who shyly pushed the door open and stood just outside the Speaker’s chamber.

  “Please, Kerianseray … come in.”

  With a deep bow, the young slave stepped hesitantly forward, keeping her face downcast.

  “You can look at me, you know. The sight of me won’t burn your eyes,” Gilthas said gently. As always, he was discomfited by the honors shown him by the palace slaves—and by this slave in particular.

  “I was told that the Speaker would be wanting his robes of office,” she said hesitantly, and Gilthas saw that Rashas, as usual, was not being subtle about pointing his young king in the direction he was supposed to go.

  “I guess you’re right … I should put them on,” he said with a sigh. “But I still have a little time before fussing with all of that.”

  Kerianseray looked at him in confusion. The wrinkling of her brow did nothing to diminish her beauty. In fact, Gilthas found her appearance utterly beguiling. His mind searched, groping for something to say that would keep her here.

  “I slept very well last night,” he declared. “That bark tea was soothing. I was fully rested with the dawn.”

  Though Gilthas didn’t want the fact widely known, his sleep had been plagued by nightmares—fierce, dire episodes of violence and tragedy—ever since he had assumed the mantle of his office. Even more than the headaches, these episodes had tormented and weakened him. So far as he knew, Rashas didn’t know of these disturbances, nor did anyone except a few of his royal slaves. He was ashamed by what he perceived as his weakness, but the images were so frightening that, when once he had awakened to find Kerianseray soothing his fevered brow with a cool cloth, he had willingly accepted her ministrations. Finally she had grown bold enough to suggest that he sip a brew before retiring, a bitter tea that she had learned to make from her Kagonesti ancestors, a mild medicine that might serve as a balm for just the kind of distress he was suffering.

  For some days, he had refused to yield to her suggestion, and she had let the matter drop. The night before last, however, he had awakened with his mouth locked in a rictus of horror, his mind reeling with the image of his mother impaled on a stake of burning wood. All around him this city of crystal and gold had been crumbling, consumed by flames that swept upward from the very ground beneath his feet.

  That experience had been so frightening that at last he had gone to Kerianseray and sought her help.

  “I am happy I was able to serve the Speaker,” she said, casting her eyes down to the floor. “His suffering is my own,” she added, almost in a whisper.

  “There is another thing you could do for me,” Gilthas said. Still Kerianseray held her eyes downcast. “Stop speaking of me as if I’m not here. Refer to me as ‘you,’ not ‘the Speaker.’ If you could do this,
it would please me very much.”

  “If the Spea—if you wish, I shall try,” the young slave replied. Despite her bronzed skin, Gilthas noticed that a blush was creeping up her cheeks, and this was an expression he found strangely attractive.

  “Has my robe been sent for?” he asked.

  “Yes. The matrons are starching it and will bring it up shortly. I shall go to help them … that is, unless the … unless you want something else.”

  I do, Gilthas thought. I want you to stay here with me. But for reasons he didn’t fully understand, he dared not put those thoughts into words. Instead, he cast around for some excuse, any excuse, that would cause her to remain.

  “The matrons will be able to starch the robe by themselves. Perhaps you would be good enough to brush my hair while we’re waiting?”

  “Of course!” Kerianseray brightened at the suggestion, and Gilthas felt unaccountably pleased by her reaction. He arranged himself in a comfortable low-backed chair, where he still had a good view of the city sprawling beyond his window. The Kagonesti slave picked up a golden brush and slowly, carefully began to stroke the locks of his long blond hair.

  He was soothed by her touch, calmed by her gentle strokes. There were times, he reflected with a sigh, when his life was not so utterly, terribly bad.

  Gilthas stood upon the rostrum in the center of the Tower of the Sun. Around him, standing attentively—there were no seats in this hallowed council hall—the robed senators of the Thalas-Enthia waited for him to bring the meeting to order. Though he did not look to the rear, the Speaker knew that Rashas would be very near, standing unobtrusively off to the side but close enough that he could reach the center of the rostrum in a pace or two should events begin to develop in a way he did not desire.

  Looking around the uncrowded chamber, Gilthas saw that several dozen of the younger senators were not in attendance. These, for the most part, had inherited their seats during the last forty years or so, following the untimely death of a noble parent. As a rule, they had tended to be more open to change than the staid elder members of the group, many of whom had held their seats for upward of four centuries. When Gilthas had been appointed Speaker, in a ceremony that, for all its rigid legality, had carried the taint of threat and extortion, many of the young senators had stalked out of the chamber. Some of them had refused to return.

  But there were still a hundred or so elves here, more than enough to make a quorum. In truth, the only thing that the young hotheads had accomplished was to deprive themselves of a voice in these councils. Gilthas truly regretted their absence. He knew that they despised him, but he hoped that if they could but see what went on in here, they would begin to see that he could offer some real hope to the future of the realm.

  The outer doors, portals of solid gold, were closed with a loud clang, sealing off the chamber from the rest of Qualinesti. Immediately Gilthas felt stifled. He wanted to throw the doors open, to admit sunlight and air, but Rashas had informed him that the volatile nature of today’s topic required that the meeting be held in secrecy.

  “I call the Thalas-Enthia to order on this day of Fourth Gateway in the month of Spring Dawning, in the year of Krynn three hundred eighty-three years after the Cataclysm.”

  The murmuring of the senators in the room died away, and many of them looked at him expectantly, curious as to the topic that had brought them here on such short notice. It irritated Gilthas to see that some elves looked past him to Rashas, but he was determined to conduct this meeting in a way that would give the reactionary senator no cause to intervene.

  “We have just received an urgent report from the western wilds of the kingdom. General Palthainon has ridden for three days over forest trails to deliver this important message. I now call upon him to make his report known to the Thalas-Enthia.”

  Palthainon, still wearing his mud-stained boots and travel-worn tunic, stood at the foot of the rostrum. The costume was for effect, Gilthas knew. He had been in the city for at least six hours since making his report to Rashas at dawn. Nevertheless, the garb served to focus the attention of the senators on the urgency of his mission. Every eye was on the general as Palthainon climbed four steps to take a position on the highest step, save for the rostrum itself. His back to Gilthas, he turned to address the gathered elves.

  “You have perhaps heard disturbing rumors out of the west, stories of banditry and robbery dating from the beginning of this summer. They have been regarded as tall tales, for the most part. Who would dare to challenge the mastery of the Qualinesti in our own domain?”

  The general’s remarks were greeted with mutters of astonishment: “Who indeed?” As Palthainon went on to describe his own mission of investigation, begun at the insistence of Rashas, of course, Gilthas tried to remember what he knew of this tall warrior who was so unusually broad-shouldered for an elf.

  Palthainon had been an appointee of Rashas, so Gilthas assumed that the warrior’s loyalty lay firmly with the elder senator. He had captained a company during the War of the Lance, when the Qualinesti elves had fled to exile on Ergoth while the unstoppable dragonarmies had claimed their homeland. Palthainon had grown rich in the practice of war, though, perhaps because he had never actually fought against the hordes of the Dark Queen. Instead, his campaigns had been limited to subjugating the Kagonesti, the wild elves, who had roamed free across Ergoth before the coming of the Qualinesti. According to his reputation, Palthainon’s company had never been beaten in battle … and if the number of wild elf slaves he had sold in the markets of Qualimor and Daltigoth was any indication, the reputation was well earned.

  Gilthas’s attention snapped back to the present as the warrior continued his story.

  “At first I was skeptical of the tales, but then I interviewed two noble elves, high lords of unimpeachable reputation, and their tale was the one that convinced me. They were both part of an overland caravan, journeying south from Caergoth with a load of gemstones and spices, having set forth to barter good Qualinesti steel and leather goods. They were not overly cautious—only a dozen guards—for they had already passed the border stones into Qualinesti. Naturally enough, they felt quite secure with the sanctity of our nation.

  “I grieve to tell you, elves of the Thalas-Enthia, that their caravan was attacked in the middle of the night. The bandits number many—the nobles estimated two hundred or more, but experience has shown me that even the most perspicacious of witnesses is untrustworthy on matters such as this. Still, the guards were overwhelmed, the cargo stolen, and the bandits made their escape into the darkness of the woods.”

  There were cries of outrage throughout the chamber, and several elves stomped their feet as they agitated for action. Gilthas held up a hand, but the gesture wasn’t enough to calm the gathering into silence. Instead, he spoke loudly, asking his question in a voice that carried over the grumbling.

  “Good general, you interviewed both of these noble elves?” he asked.

  “Yes, Honored Speaker, and their tales matched in every detail. It may interest you to know that I spoke with them separately, so that they did not have the advantage of each hearing the other’s testimony.”

  “A splendid precaution,” Gilthas agreed. “But I take it that, since they were able to talk, neither of them met with harm during this episode?”

  “No, Honored Speaker. As a matter of fact, neither of them showed the mark of a single wound.” Palthainon’s tone was a little scornful as he shared this information.

  “And the guards … were many of them killed?”

  “Their testimony included no remarks as to the state of the guards,” the general said with a shrug.

  And you didn’t think to ask! Gilthas wanted to voice the rebuke but decided that it was more politic to bite his tongue. “Still, we can assume that if great bloodshed was wrought among the escort, the nobles would have mentioned the fact as part of their testimony.”

  “It is a logical assumption,” agreed the warrior.

  “I fail to s
ee what difference the relative wounding of the victims bears upon the facts here,” Rashas interjected. “Clearly a crime has occurred.”

  “Very clearly,” Gilthas agreed genially. “I merely wish to establish the exact nature of that crime.”

  “The crime is robbery, theft of legitimate imported goods!” declared Palthainon. “We have evidence and testimony to that effect.”

  “Yes … in fact, we’ve had testimony to that effect for a week, if I recall correctly.”

  “But this is testimony from reliable sources!” the general retorted.

  “To be sure … and since this testimony is the same as we heard days earlier, doesn’t that prove that the other sources were reliable as well?” Gilthas was actually enjoying himself.

  “Enough!” Rashas snapped the command, and the Speaker felt as though a leash had been jerked tightly around his neck. The senator continued, obviously doing his best to speak in a level and reasonable tone. “We now have the proof we lacked before. Doesn’t this suggest that the Thalas-Enthia proceed to the consideration of some sort of action?”

  “It does,” Gilthas agreed, forcing himself to reply in kind.

  Senator Fallitarian, a doddering elder known to be a fervent supporter of Rashas, made the motion. “We should send a company of warriors to the west … patrol the trails, bring the rascals to justice!”

  “Here, here!” The suggestion was echoed throughout the chamber.

  “A single company?” Rashas interjected, with a deliberative scowl. “Two hundred elves to hunt down and capture a band that might be their equal in numbers, if we are to believe the words of the witnesses?”

  “We should make it at least three companies,” Gilthas suggested. “That way, they can patrol a larger area and will be readily available to reinforce each other should the bandits prove to be numerous.”

  “Excellent idea,” Rashas concurred.

  Gilthas was paradoxically annoyed with himself to find that the senator’s praise pleased him.

  “Three companies it is!” Senator Fallitarian fell into rank. “I submit that General Palthainon should be appointed their general.”